By Banji Ayoola
Oyo State Government has refuted claims that the State has not accessed its N715 million counterpart funds for the Universal Basic Education Commission/SUBEB Year 2020 Intervention Projects.
While reacting in Ibadan to allegations that the state government has failed to pay its counterpart fund to access the projects, the Executive Chairman, Oyo State Universal Basic Education Board, SUBEB, Dr. Nureni Adeniran affirmed that the State has in fact paid counterpart funds for 2020 and 2021 to UBEC.
He said: “Oyo state does not belong to the categories of states that failed to pay counterpart funds to access UBEC matching grants as being erroneously peddled in the above news item.”
The Radiance had reported on Wednesday August 18, that 26 states including Oyo failed to access the funds in a story titled: “Ondo, Osun, Ekiti, Ogun, Oyo, Imo, Kwara, Kaduna, 14 others failed to access UBEC’s N29.3 cash.”
But in a statement on Thursday by the spokesman of Oyo SUBEB, Mr Olamide Adeniji, the chairman said: “The responsive administration of Governor Seyi Makinde has been faithful to the release of funds for the Basic Education sub-sector, in order to tackle the growing number of children in the State’s Primary schools.
“Dr. Adeniran maintained that the federal agency essentially is in receipt of the counterpart grant paid by the state government for Years 2020 and 2021.
“We equally have evidence of the payment and lodgement of the money.”
“Oyo state does not belong to the categories of states that failed to pay counterpart funds to access UBEC matching grants as being erroneously peddled in the above news item”.
“Dr. Adeniran, while stressing that the federal government agency has done due diligence, after receipt of the counetrpart funds and the Action Plans for the projects, also maintained that UBEC has sent its team of experts to carry out verification exercise on all the proposed construction/ renovation as well as the school furniture and boreholes to be sunk.
“They have completed the exercise and submitted their report. There is no doubt that the matching grants will be released to the State any moment from now because UBEC is at the final stage of the exercise”, he said.
According to the statement, “UBEC grants are recurring annual federal educational grants to state governments accessed after payment of specified matching counterpart funds. Despite the huge amounts normally required as counterpart fund, the Oyo State Government under Governor Seyi Makinde has not fialed in releasing its part of the funds”.
“He advised journalists and online bloggers to clarify stories from the right quarters before misleading the public, saying the State Government’s claims can be confirmed from UBEC office, Abuja.
“Therefore, it is a misinformation on the part of anybody to say that Oyo State fail to pay the counterpart fund. That statement amounts to nothing but Absolute Falsehood. The author of such news should have done a thorough check of their facts from the most credible source i.e UBEC and verify all the processes earlier stated above as having taken place.”
According to the report: “At least 26 states, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), failed to provide matching grants to access the basic education development fund last year.
This is according to data from the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC).
The records show that as of August 17, some states did not provide the 50 per cent matching grants to access the N29, 383, 637, 521. 72 with the commission.
The N29.3 billion, which represents figures from 2005, contradicts the N130 billion claim by Education Minister, Adamu Adamu at the 65th National Council on Education meeting in Jalingo, the Taraba State capital, last Thursday.
Adamu, represented by Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, had regretted the inability of some states to access the funds, asking the affected states to re-prioritise basic education.
According to the records from the commission, only Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Jigawa, Kano, Kebbi, Rivers, Yobe and Zamafara provided the 50 per cent matching grant and fully accessed their funds in 2020.
Ogun did not access its N2, 726, 235, 8829. 08 that has been with the commission since 2019.
Others are Anambra (N2, 234, 958, 215. 39), Edo (N2, 234, 958, 215. 38), Imo (N2, 234, 958, 215. 39), Niger (N1, 728, 331, 188. 82) and Enugu (N1, 567, 052, 793. 43).
In the Southwest, only Lagos accessed the fund in 2020; Rivers, Bayelsa, Delta and Akwa Ibom accessed it in the SouthSouth; only Yobe took it in the Northeast as well as Jigawa, Kano, Kebbi and Zamafara in Northwest.
No Southeast and Northcentral state provided the 50 per cent matching grant in 2020 to access the fund.
Other states that did not access their funds and how much they are entitled to are Abia (N741, 505, 036. 67), Adamawa (N715, 074, 142. 53), Akwa Ibom (N91, 277, 610. 32), Bauchi (N715, 099, 008. 23) and Benue (N715, 094, 142. 53).
Others are Borno (N715, 074, 135. 21), Cross River (N717, 121, 163. 55), Ebonyi (N2, 234, 958, 215. 39), Edo (N2, 234, 958, 215. 38) and Ekiti (N715, 074, 136. 53), Gombe (N715, 074, 136. 53), Kaduna (N715, 074, 136. 49), Katsina (N715, 074, 136. 53), Kogi (N715, 094, 136. 53), Kwara (N715, 216, 325. 23), Nasarawa (N715, 075, 137. 22) and Ondo (N715, 074, 136. 53).
The rest are Osun (N715, 074, 136. 53), Oyo (N715, 074, 136. 53), Plateau (N715, 074, 136. 53), Sokoto (N715, 074, 136. 53), Taraba (N715, 074, 136. 53) and the FCT (N715, 074, 137. 46).
The commission added that it has disbursed N500, 198, 430, 904. 47 to states from 2005.
Governors had complained about the 50 per cent matching grant.”
